THIS has been a grim week. The evidence of appalling and degrading abuses of Iraqi prisoners in the Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad is there for all to see.

It is dreadful for those who were the victims of this abuse but it has also unquestionably been damaging of our collective efforts to help create a better Iraq. As our Prime Minister Tony Blair told the House of Commons last week, "this is what we went to Iraq to get rid of, not to perpetuate".

So what is there to say? First, let's deal with the position of the British detention facilities and the allegations of abuse by British soldiers, including, it has been claimed, by members of our Queen's Lancashire Regiment. There have been a very few isolated allegations. Each has been investigated fully. The "photographs" published by the Daily Mirror claiming to show a British soldier urinating on a hooded detainee are almost certainly fakes. We await final conclusions on this.

But we should all be clear that British soldiers and other members of our armed forces have and are doing a wonderful job in Iraq in difficult and dangerous circumstances. That includes many from East Lancashire, regulars and reservists, in the Queen's Lancashire Regiment and other units.

And this view is not just mine or the British government's but is expressed repeatedly by Iraqi leaders - as two who visited London last week did so direct to me. In addition, I should say that the head of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) told me last May that he was generally satisfied with the conduct of British forces in Iraq.

Tragically, the evidence of abuse by US personnel in the Abu Ghraib jail in Baghdad is correct. Everyone in the US Administration accepts that, and is equally as horrified as are we all.

Nothing can put the clock back, but the abuse is being thoroughly investigated. And it's important to note that a major investigation was started some months before the news broke in the newspapers, in January. The investigation is thorough - it can been read in full on the web on www.agonist.org/annex/taguba.htm.

There is this point to make too. It's quite tricky to say at this time, because it may sound like an excuse, which it is not.

Nothing can excuse what has been exposed. But it is an explanation. Abuses of human rights can occur in any kind of state. But they are much less probable in democracies; and where they do occur in democracies the big difference is that they can and are fully investigated and the perpetrators dealt with. The tyrannical regime of Saddam Hussein was in a league of its own for terror. The UN has estimated in its reports up to 300,000 victims of terror, uncovered in mass graves. But no pictures of these atrocities appeared, because exposing them far from being a citizen's duty, was a crime. The media was completely controlled.

One of the many tragedies from this evidence of abuse is how much it has obscured significant progress in Iraq.

Scores of newspapers, radio and TV stations; scores of political parties; the ownership of satellite dishes a right, no longer a crime (as it was under Saddam). Real progress on reconstruction and development. In Basra alone more than 90 schools and 48 health care projects have been completed. A new water ring main is being installed.

And there's progress on the political front too. In Washington tomorrow I shall be seeing my "G8" colleague foreign ministers to discuss, among other things, a new United Nations Security Council Resolution to provide for the handover of sovereignty to the Iraqi people on June 30.